Constraining the Pluripotent Fate of Human Embryonic Stem Cells for Tissue Engineering and Cell Therapy - The Turning Point of Cell-Based Regenerative Medicine

Induction of sensory neurons from neuroepithelial stem cells by the ISX9 small molecule

Hearing impairment most often involves loss of sensory hair cells and auditory neurons. As this loss is permanent in humans, a cell therapy approach has been suggested to replace damaged cells. It is thus of interest to generate lineage restricted progenitor cells appropriate for cell based therapies. Human long-term self-renewing neuroepithelial stem (lt-NES) cell lines exhibit in vitro a developmental potency to differentiate into CNS neural lineages, and importantly lack this potency in vivo, i.e do not form teratomas. Small-molecules-driven differentiation is today an established route obtain specific cell derivatives from stem cells. In this study, we have investigated the effects of three small molecules SB431542, ISX9 and Metformin to direct differentiation of lt-NES cells into sensory neurons. Exposure of lt-NES cells to Metformin or SB431542 did not induce any marked induction of markers for sensory neurons. However, a four days exposure to the ISX9 small molecule resulted in reduced expression of NeuroD1 mRNA as well as enhanced mRNA levels of GATA3, a marker and important player in auditory neuron specification and development. Subsequent culture in the presence of the neurotrophic factors BDNF and NT3 for another seven days yielded a further increase of mRNA expression for GATA3. This regimen resulted in a frequency of up to 25-30% of cells staining positive for Brn3a/Tuj1. We conclude that an approach with ISX9 small molecule induction of lt-NES cells into auditory like neurons may thus be an attractive route for obtaining safe cell replacement therapy of sensorineural hearing loss.

Direct Conversion of Pluripotent Human Embryonic Stem Cells Under Defined Culture Conditions into Human Neuronal or Cardiomyocyte Cell Therapy Derivatives

Developing novel strategies for well-controlled efficiently directing pluripotent human embryonic stem cells (hESCs) exclusively and uniformly towards clinically relevant cell types in a lineage-specific manner is not only crucial for unveiling the molecular and cellular cues that direct human embryogenesis but also vital to harnessing the power of hESC biology for tissue engineering and cell-based therapies. Conventional hESC differentiation methods require uncontrollable simultaneous multi-lineage differentiation of pluripotent cells, which yield embryoid bodies (EB) or aggregates consisting of a mixed population of cell types of three embryonic germ layers, among which only a very small fraction of cells display targeted differentiation, impractical for commercial and clinical applications. Here, a protocol for lineage-specific differentiation of hESCs, maintained under defined culture systems, direct from the pluripotent stage using small-molecule induction exclusively and uniformly to a neural or a cardiac lineage is described. Lineage-specific differentiation of pluripotent hESCs by small-molecule induction enables well-controlled highly efficient direct conversion of nonfunctional pluripotent hESCs into a large supply of high-purity functional human neuronal or cardiomyocyte cell therapy derivatives for commercial and therapeutic uses.